The Art of Breaking
by elemental helper
Summary: The game's changing, what will be your move? Miles doesn't know who the man was or what his strange words meant, but knows what he has to do. He has to find someone lost in the darkness of his past, someone who he could never bring himself to think about
1. Chapter 1

Life is shrouded with a black veil made from spite and rage, furged out of the finest darkness of evil. We all possess some form of this darkness inside of us, fears and flaws that haunt us in our nightmares, that hid behind each and every trouble in our life. Ready to take hold, and to devoure us with teeth of our own making, to throw us in the river of fire and drown us with the weights we have created with all the unrepented sins we have said, bonds holding all our broken promises and hearts, all our shame and indignity, all our hiding.

We all have our own destiny there is no point in denying that. But we do not choose our destiny, it has been written out long before our births in the stars, though, it is our choices that create that destiny. In all of time, destiny has been fought over. The undefeatable forces of good and evil will forever battle over each other, urging people with quiet screaming voices to cross over to where they lie.

This story is one of the stories written in the stars, that tell a tale of destinies combined together in this battle.

I have recalled this story many times, many heart wrenching times I open the old book of life and death and I flip to this chapter of the book. Here, in this chapter, there are many characters, all having their role to play. All parts of a greater destiny at the time these people couldn't understand.

The hero, the traitor, the liar, the villian, the misunderstood, the confused, the agonized and the pain, the martyar, the puppet, and the puppet master. Do not deem the characters to what you believe they are, for, everyone holds these things inside of them, only at the end of our story may you be able to identify these people who they really are. But only at the end.

And, since I prefer to start my stories at the beginning, we shall start there.

It was cold and dark, the sky was a evil shade of black as the sleet whipped down from its' shaded folds. Lightning struck down from the earth, it's glowing light revealing no mercy, the flashes only illuminated the proof of how unjust life could be. Each strick showed a battle field. No longer fought on, no longer supporting enraged forms of battling life. Only mangled and strewn corpses. A few still lived, all either missing limbs or all so disfigured they couldn't be identified. They were all of one people, destroyed by their own greed.

Only one still walked among them, cheeks stained with blood and leg dragging. He didn't cry. He didn't cry when he saw the people, his people reach out for help, crying out to him to move them out of the sleet, to help them. He was a boy, no older than thirteen, yet he didn't cry.

A hand grabbed his injured foot, and dragged him to the ground, the boy flipped himself over and looked at the man who was holding him. "Ar...Ar...blesio! Ab!" _(Ar...Ar...please! Son!)_ The man pleaded, blood sputtering from out of the mans mouth and onto Ar's face. Ar reached down to grab his fathers' hand, his father looked up at him with expecting blue eyes. His son would help him. He placed his hand gently on top of his fathers, and smiled. "Thank you son."

They were family.

Without warning, Ar grabbed a tight hold of his fathers' hand and pulled back with all his strength and twisted. His father scream was blocked out by a roar of thunder as his son pulled his hand off. The boy kicked him, and he fell onto his back, clutching the stump at the top of his forearm, blood flowing from between his fingers.

Willed at the sight of his father bleeding, the boy grabbed hold of his fathers' long black hair, and pulled him up onto his knees, "Darfod!" He snarled. He placed his hand on his father's chest and pushed forward, pushed through the skin and ribs to the heart. His father's eyes widened and blood began to flow from his ears and his nose, he coughed up more blood as the energy was drained from him.

Ar's eyes rolled back, but, instead of white, there was only black, and when he dropped the corpse of his father, and his eyes rolled back to the way they had been, they were still black. With small little red embers glowing in them.

He staggered backwards, the pain had been more than he anticipated, and tears began to roll down his face. Not from pain though, he was oblivious to the pain at this point, but at what he had become. He fell to the ground beside his father, and burried his head into his father's chest, blood was still spewing from the wound he had created with his hand, but he didn't care. "Gwnawn mo feddwl at! Faddau 'm dadogi!" _(I didn't mean to! Forgive me father!)_

But he had meant it, he had meant to steal the life from his father, and he knew it, he knew what he was. Yet he still mourned, yet he still cried for what he had done. He wanted to have this all taken away, he wanted to be free from this, he wanted to repent.

"Beth naethoch?" _(What have you done?)_ A voice shouted. Ar looked up, the sleet and the tears blocked out his vision, but he could just make out the light blond hair and white eyes of his brother.

"Ferthyra! Fi...fi..." _(Ferthyra! I...I...) _He began, looking down at his blood soaked, shaking hands. Ferthyra took a horrifide step back, and there was no masking the look of fear and betrayal in his white eyes, his brother...the only family he would have left after the battle. Was a murderer...how could he ever forget that? How could he live with his father's killer? He was gaping for words now, "Edifara!" _(I am sorry!) _

His brother only shook his head, and bent down to touch the mutilated figure of his father, he reached for his fathers' hand, only to find that it wasn't there. He could tell that it had been ripped off, reaching over he grabbed the other hand and pulled it to his heart, tears silently slipping down his face. Warshing a path in the blood. Ar reached down to try and comfort Ferthyra, or maybe to even hold his father. "NA!" He said, "Ach llofrudd!"_(No, you are a murderer!)_ Ar recoiled at his brother's words, was that who he was meant to be? A murderer? A rage flared inside of him, not directly at Ferthyra or his father, but at the whole cursed world.

The taller boy stood up, and turned around to face his dark haired brother, "'ch shall dalu!"_(You shall pay!)_ He snarled, and lunged forward, ramming Ar with all his strength in the chest.

He fell down hard, slidding back a good distance in the mud and the blood, the lightening was flashing more harshly now, and the sleet had been replaced with freezing rain. He was yanked up by his shirt, and Ferthyra punched him in the face twice before dropping him to the ground, sputtering and bleeding from his nose.

Ar had fallen on his stomach, he just barely lift his head, the red embers in his hands were glowing now, and he looked down at his hands, they were hot. A small orb of fire began to form, hovering over his hands. This wasn't his power, this was his father's, he had just absorbed the power.

When Ferthyra grabbed his collar again and hoisted his feet off the ground, Ar slammed the fire ball into his brother's face, singing the skin through. Screaming in pain, he dropped Ar and touched his face, Ar watched as the burnt skin disapeared and was replaced with new. "Ad."_(Leave)_ His brother muttered, still touching his face as if the burn was still there. He backed up a bit, surprised at the force that was in his brothers' words. "Ad." Ferthyra said again, his voice moditone and cold. With each word his brother said, he felt himself be pushed backwards by an invisibal force. "AD!" He screamed again, and Ar was sent flying across the ground onto a pile of corpses. Groaning, he looked up and saw his brother stalking forward, white eyes glowing through the rain and darkness. Cursing, he stood up and ran off, still limping and dragging his foot as he went.

He didn't look back until he was at the very outskirts of the village, he could still see his brothers' enraged face glaring down at him, he looked down at his hands, a fire ball was growing in each one, there was burning inside of him and he combined the fire balls, it was still small, but bigger. Lifting the flame to his face, he realized that this is what he wanted.

Power.

And he would take all he needed to get that power, he would kill to get it, all his life, he had been the servent, but he would be the master. He would finally hold the power.

Perhaps, if Ferthyra hadn't been consumed in such anger and hadn't attacked his brother, things would have been different. But, as said before, it is our choices that lead to our destiny, not the other way around.

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><p><strong>(Present Day New York-Empire State Building)<strong>

A cloaked figure stood ontop of the state building, one hand was held out, and a fire ball was formed in the middle of his palm, it was large. Much larger than the ones he had formed when he was a child. It had grown with him, yet it left an icy feeling in him. He could control this fire, yet he was as cold as the ice that was inside of him. As cold as the rain and sleet had been.

"Sir, we should move on." A voice said, and Ar turned around slowly. A boy with dark brown hair and dark green eyes was standing behind him, taking sudden interest in his feet, he waited for Ar's response.

The man turned back around, to stare at the city bellow him, he opened up his hand again and gazed at the fire ball fondly, as if it was a person with a mind and spirit. "Look at this Legion." He said to the boy, holding out his hand to show the fire ball that moved with the lava swirling in it, "This is the perfect example of how fragile life can be, in the coldness, it brings warmth, in the night, it provides us with life." Legion looked at him in confusion as Ar moved his hands overtop of it, making it grow a little bigger, "Yet, in the day, there is no need for it, and in the warmth, coldness is what we want, not more heat." He tipped his hand and let the fire ball drop over the edge of the building.

Legion didn't know how to reply, "I don't understand." He replied.

Ar shook his head and chuckled lowly, "I didn't expect you to, I didn't expect anyone to understand the fragility of life." He looked over the city once more, "Everything can be broken, and we are the breaking." He whispered to himself, though it was loud enough that Legion could hear and ponder over it. "Now come, we can not keep the others waiting."

With that, he turned his back on the city, and walked towards the stairs, with the smallest flick of his hand, the door flew off its' hinges, and he began the long walk down the stairs with Legion in short persuit.


	2. Chapter 2

**Elemental: **_Ok guys, we just want to say that we ARE GOING TO GET EVERYONE'S CHARACTER IN! But, it might take a little time because we don't want to, like, over run you all with these characters. We are going to throw in a lot of people in the third chapter probably, but, we're probably not going to be using names only descriptions..._  
><strong>Helper: <strong>_Because, you know when you read something and they fling all these new characters at you in an attempt to fit everyone in? We don't want to do that, we want to get everyone in, in an orderly and functional way in a way to provide less confusion for readers._  
><strong>Elemental: <strong>_Sorry if we're babbling, it's 9:00 PM here, way past our sleeping times. (Hey, we're farmers! We get up early...) Oh, huge thing I need to add, in the OC creation thing, we forgot to ask you to add the X-Men Names you know, like Cyclops and Quicksilver and Shadowcat and Boom-Boom and..._  
><strong>Helper: <strong>_THEY GET THE IDEA NOW SHUT UP!_  
><strong>Elemental: *Blinks* <strong>_Oh yeah, you get grumpy when you don't get your sleep..._  
><strong>Helper: *sighs* <strong>_so, please, reply with their names, or I might have to give Elemental permission to give them names..._

* * *

><p>In the darkest part of New York city, two very unlikely creatures stood beside each other. One was a human, with looks that made him seem five or six years younger than he actually was. He was short, which added to the thought that he was only thirteen or fourteen, his hair was black and messy, cut short so that it spiked up naturally. His eyes were also black, and he had a permantly split lip. His over all apperance was that of a puppy, one that had been abused, thrown out on the street, taken in, and was abused again.<p>

The one beside him was a coyote, wirey and long limbed, all its ribs easily accounted for. There was a gleam in its yellow eyes, with something darkner lying underneith.

"Are you sure about this place, it looks a little...ugh..." The teenager said, rubbing his neck as he looked at the club. There was no line, which was always a good thing, less comotion, but there was also a door-guard, over weight and dressed in black with dark shades on. "I'm not sure he'll let us in, well, maybe me, not you." He said, looking down to his compainion.

The coyote shook his head and chuckled lowly, "Trust me Miles, he'll let us in, they always let us in." It said in a rough, unnatural sounding voice. "Now, get going." He growled, nudding his leg with his head so the boy was forced to go forward, tripping over himself as he did.

Miles glared at the coyote and approached the door, the guard turned his head and Miles could feel his icey glare through the glasses, he had to get control of himself. How many times has he done this? To many for him to be worrying about being beat up or refused entrance. He held out an ID card to the guard, of course it was a fake, and the guard wasn't going to be fooled that easily. "Is this some kind of joke kid, a dare maybe?" Miles put on his confused face, "14 year olds aren't allowed in the club."

The boy laughed, of course it was forced, but he had practiced this laugh so many times even he couldn't tell the difference. "I understand how you can think that, but I'm not 14, I'm 21." He said, flashing a smile. Well, he was 17, but 21 wasn't that far off.

"I'm not an idiot, you and your dog aren't allowed in here." The meat-loaf replied, crossing his arms against his chest. "Now scram before I make you!"

It was then that the coyote, Puppet, stepped forward, seeing that his friend was making no progress in getting them into this club. The coyote's normally tan eyes were glowing a vivid yellow as he stepped toward the guard, seeing through his sunglasses, staring into the very depths of his soul. "You will let us in, and there are no rules against _coyotes _being allowed in."

There was a pause and the guard looked confused before rubbing his bald head and stepping aside, "You can go in, there are no rules against coyotes in this club." He said in a far off voice.

Always worried about how long the trance would hold up, and if it would wear away, Miles hurried inside, Puppet meanwhile took his time prancing past the guard on light paws. The door closed, blocking them access from the outside world and leaving them in a dark, smoke filled hallway. "Always freaks me out when you do that." Miles muttered to Puppet quietly as they continued to walk down the hallway, the music was louder now, almost uncomfortably loud, and there were more people, making out pressing each other against the walls. "Get a room." Miles whispered to himself when he saw one 'couple's' make out session go beyond making out.

The hallway ended with two doors, Miles could already smell the unmistakable stench of alchol, and he could now identify the song that was playing as Hot Mess by Cobra Starship. He looked down at Puppet unsurely, the coyote just stared ahead, waiting for him to push open the doors. Which he relucantly did.

A wave of smells and sounds hit him with such force that he recoiled back a few steps, but Puppet continued to walk forward and Miles forced himself forward. The place was large, it had used to be a factory for making something, donuts or pretzels, and the large convayor belt that had lead the doe to the furnace was still there, along with the giant furnace. Of course, it was no longer in use and was covered in graffitti. The club itself was dimly lit, and the wall color couldn't be seen through all the paint that was on it. Not surprisingly, it was crowded.

The largest crowd was at the stage, where the pole-dancers danced, women in skimpy outfits carried beer and sat in mens' laps, Miles averted his eyes to this. People degrading themselves to work here. A few people cast confused glances at the boy and coyote as they slowly made their way to the back, but no one argued with their presence.

At the back, Miles felt a little safer, but, at the same time, a little more fearful. It was darker than the rest of the place, but quieter, there were fewer people, but the people that were here looked tougher, more ready to get in a fight if needed.

This is where the gammblers and hustlers went if they wanted to try their hands. Miles and Puppet were catigorized in the latter.

They made their way back to a table consisting of people with eye patches and cowboy hats, looked like Pirates Vs. Cowboys and Miles could hardly contain the laughter. One of the guys with an eye patch and a badly scared face looked at Miles and Puppet, "Looks like the circus is in town." But no other comment was made, Miles knew that it was Puppet's doing that kept them from refusing to let them play.

It was also Puppet who had caused him to win all the games he played.

Five games later, Miles had over a thousand dollars in his back pack, which he slung over his shoulder, the people he had played were looking at him with confused eyes. Some of the eye patch people had even lifted their eye patches up. No doubt they knew they had been hustled, and Miles hurried away from them with Puppet at his heels, heading to the door.

Sadly, they had to get through the crowd at the stage, which was more than a challenge in itself, and when the two finally did go through the doors, back into the foggy hallway, he felt the need to tear his eyeballs out, just to rid himself from the hideous sight he had just encountered. Shuddering, he hurried past the people making out, hurried through the hallway, hurried past the guard and through the streets.

"That was a good night, didn't lose a game." Puppet commented. Miles nodded, but he was still hurrying, he didn't want to think about that place, "You know, have we ever lost a game?" He asked.

Miles shook his head, "Nah, we've never been not allowed in a club either." Running a hand through his already messy hair, he sat down on the steps of a run down building, a few lights were flickering inside and through the open windows Miles could hear shouting from the inhabitants of the building. But there was something else, something not from the building, "Hey...do you hear that?" He asked, standing up.

Puppet looked up and flicked his ears, "Yeah, a lot of commotion in that building, huh?"

The black haired boy shook his head, "No, not that, there's something else." He said, walking with some new found urgancy. Puppet flicked his long, pointed ears back, of course he had heard something else, and he already knew what it was. "Come on Puppet!" Miles called in a whisper. What was the point of whispering when he said it so loud any way?

Sighing, the coyote got up on his lengthy legs and trotted to catch up with the boy. They walked past a few buildings, the sounds were getting louder, and Miles knew that it was a fight, he could just make out a few voices and words as he inched along the side of a building and peered into an alley.

There were at least seven people surronding one in the middle, "Come on Freak!" One of the people, a boy, must have been the age of Miles shouted, he was wielding a bat and swinging it madly in the air. Other people called out names, and there was a crack as one of the bats struck bone, and a cry. The crowd broke apart, broke apart for a meer instant of a second, and Miles looked at the mutant who was in the middle of the circle, and she looked back with wide grey eyes before the crowd closed in around her again.

She hadn't been old, thirteen, maybe, but she had had ears, with black and gold hair that covered her face, she was a mutant, but she wasn't old. She was young...Miles turned his head, and Puppet bit his hand and dragged him away. The last thing he heard before closing his ears off to the world, was screaming of a woman, and the punks calling her names just as evil as what they had called the child, but they had run away.

Miles took comfort in that, but not much.

The girl had looked at him, making him drown in her grey eyes, drown in the tears that were in them. Yet he had done nothing, he felt sick. But what could he have done?

Puppet took him to one of the parks and he found himself laying on his back in the grass, the coyote was sleeping, or pretending, to sleep beside him. Miles eyes stared up into the sky, he couldn't see the stars, had he ever seen them? When he was younger perhaps, in the country, but not any more.

"Puppet, we should have helped that girl today, you know, the girl with the lynx ears." Miles said. Puppet perked his ears and growled, flipping over to face away from the boy, he liked to sleep, he wanted to sleep, "We're mutants."

The silence was deafening, and for a few seconds Miles wondered if Puppet had fallen alseep again, this was a very touchy subject for the coyote, and he knew that he mostly avoided the subject. "We're all mutants in some way Miles, that doesn't mean that we need to help every single person."

"Yeah...but if we see someone being beaten, or hurt, shouldn't we at least help then?"

"Things get hurt everyday, things get broken, no one can stop that, the sooner you learn that, the better chance of living you have, it's life kid, get over it." Puppet snarled back.

Miles nodded, Puppet was right, that was life, and he couldn't change it, he was Miles...just Miles, Miles who might or might not be like the mutant who was beat up. But why did it feel so wrong when he saw mutants being beaten and when he did nothing to stop it? He took a breath, and decided to take a risk, Puppet had already talked about a subject he didn't normally, Miles doubted that he would answer this question, "Do you ever think about your pups, like, where they are and...if they're alive..." He whispered the last part.

"Everyday."

Miles didn't ask any more questions.

* * *

><p>"Get away from me!" The voice shattered Miles from his dreamless sleep, Puppet had taught him to be alert, and he strained his ears. "Please, just, leave me alone!" It was close. He had no idea of what time it was, early enough in the morning that no birds were out and the sun still couldn't be seen.<p>

He got up slowly, crouching down he listened, there was more shouting, "Stay down, Miles!" Puppet snarled at him. For once, Miles didn't listen, he stood up slowly and began to move forward, he was moving automatically, moving towards a fight he knew he wouldn't want to see. But he couldn't stop himself. "Don't do it Miles, you're going to get yourself killed!" Miles ignored him again and began to jog.

The park was small and polluted, with an alage infested pond and a few tiny deformed trees. By the pond was where he saw the people. There was no doubt in his mind that these were the same people who had attacked the lynx eared girl, they must have been going after mutants all night, it angered him, and something sparked.

He moved forward catiously, ducking in the shadows the city lights cast along the ground. There was another girl, clutching her arm, blood trickling from between her fingers. "Please, I haven't done anything to you!"

She had choppy dyed red hair, and wide blue eyes that gleamed in the city light. The people came closer to her again, holding bats and, God help her, guns. "Have you seen enough?" A voice said from beside him, and he jumped up before realizing that it was Puppet. His rugged grey fur was rippling with a slight wind. "We have to leave, it's not our place to help." He said, turning and walking away.

Miles began to follow, he had already started to block out her voice in his head, but something stopped him. Fate, destiny, whatever it was called to him so strong he couldn't ignore. Something inside Miles Shepard snapped that night, something had been planted inside of him that he couldn't ignore. He stopped following Puppet and turned around slowly, walking in the other direction, heading to the fight. The growing was taking place, and he didn't mind letting this take over him.

"Stop!" Miles shouted when he was close enough. He surprised himself at how strong his voice sounded, considering how sick and weak he felt inside. They ignored him, to busy mocking the girl, "I said...STOP!" He shouted the last part, and all eyes turned to him. "Leave her alone." He said.

A guy had been holding her by her neck, but he dropped her now, and she slumped to the ground, coughing and trying to take as much air in as possible. "Are you a mutant too?" Miles didn't reply, but he could feel something inside of him, shocking him, and it wanted to be let out. "Hey guys, looks like we're killing two birds with one stone now." He said, smiling. There was a sudden scream and a gurgling, and all eyes looked turned to look back.

One of the thungs' eyes were wide, his face was contorted with an expression of both pain and surprise, with a shaking hand he touched his throat and pulled away, looking down in horror at the blood soaking his hand. He tried to say something, but, instead, sunk to his knees, then fell face first into the dirt. Miles eyes widened, there, standing behind the fallen body, was Puppet, blood was dripping from his muzzle and he spat a bloody piece of flesh out. It landed on the corpses spasming back.

There was a moment of stunned silence, shock from everyone. The guy was...dead?

Miles wasn't moving or breathing, still staring at the body, until a fist to the face knocked him out of it, he staggered backwards and blinked in surprise, his nose hurt, but not enough to be broken. The boy threw another punch, and Miles managed to dodge and grabbed his attackers leg, pulling back so that he fell backwards.

He looked to where the girl had been, looked just in time to see her taking on two of the punks at once, he couldn't help but stare as she siccor kicked one guy and then flipped the other over. She seemed perfectly capible of taking care of herself, so why was he here? Oh, yeah, because he didn't follow Puppet's advice and go back to sleep. There was a loud bang and Mlies turned around just in time to see Puppet go down onto his side, his fore paw flaying in the air helplessly as he tried to regain his footing. The shooter raised his gun again.

Without knowing what he was doing, he lifted his hands, there was a uncomfortable tingling sensation in them and, with a scream of pain, a jet of electricity flew from them.

The shooter dropped his gun as his body was wracked in spasms, shocks sending him onto his knees.

Miles scream was cut short, his mouth was still open, but only electricity was coming out of it, no sound but the roar of static and the abnormally quick beating of his heart. His neck snapped backwards, and, without meaning too, he opened his eyes wider...the pain nearly tore him apart, nearly killed him from the agony. But the pain soon stopped, leaving him numb.

There was only white, he was surronded in it, warshed in it. There was nothing. No pain, no breathing, no feeling what-so-ever. Was he alive, was this what death was?

There was a brightness, brighter than the white, so bright it made white look black, but it was gone as soon as it came. Then it was back, what was that? No, _who_, not what, was that? Who was it that was invading in this world he had created out of his pain, this painless world that had been built on the very thing that it was not.

It was a boy, six or seven, eight at the most, dressed in ragged white clothes, he walked as if he was floating, his strides were that as if he was walking, yet he did it in such a way that Miles knew he wasn't. His hair was a blond so light that it almost blended in the whiteness around. His eyes were glowing silver, lacking pupils, and coated over with a white film. Yet Miles knew he wasn't blind, it felt like he had known this boy his whole life, but he didn't remember who it was or when and where he had come into contact with him. He opened his mouth, but no words came out, the only thing he heard was his heart beat, the _thud-thud-thump-thud _was the only sound able to penetrate this world with noise.

The apparation held a finger up to its lips, and then extended his hand out to touch Miles' forehead. That was when the world of white fell apart and disapeared, giving into a empty void of black, and Miles was sent falling, falling, falling forever, falling, not able to see the ground. Falling.

_Thump-thud-thud-thud-thud-thump-thump..._

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><p><strong>Helper: <strong>_We both worked really hard on this, like, we both read through this chapter like fourteen times fixing and adding and deleting things._  
><strong>Elemental: <strong>_Yeah, we redid this whole chapter, like deleted, scrapped and everything about five times then we decided on something we liked and went to bed, ready to post the next chapter in the morning._  
><strong>Helper: <strong>_But after sleeping on it, we realized that we needed to fix it AGAIN!_**  
>Elemental: <strong>_Oh, yeah we wanted to add that the mutants you saw in this chapter were...The lynx eared girl: Mayura McCabe and the next girl being attacked: Six_  
><strong>Helper: <strong>_Mayura was submitted and created by Cerridwen-Maiden and Six was made and owned by Selena Halliwell-714_  
><strong>Elemental: <strong>_Also, in the last chapter we used Legion, who was given to us by Raimaru13_


	3. Chapter 3

_The day was hot and humid, the horse flies were biting hard and quick with a hunger for blood that humans didn't understand. The young boy didn't mind though, he ran ahead of his family with his little sister, younger by three years, tripping and falling after him, he laughed as he raced along, in his mind, he was the fastest person on earth, no one could catch him! No one aside from papa at least. But papa was the greatest at everything so he didn't count. The boys hair was black, messy and short, his eyes were the deepest and darkest shade of brown, black from a distance, he was seven years old. _

_'Miles, please slow down, give Mason a chance to catch up!' Mama shouted. Being to young to obey his mother, he hurried ahead, faster, not willing to wait up. If his sister wasn't fast enough to get him, then she didn't deserve to be running with him. _

_Young Miles had traveled this dusty un-pathed back road many times, Mama enjoyed going to the lake to read and tan, while Papa liked to fish and swim here. Miles liked going to the lake with Papa best because sometimes Papa would let him throw the fish he caught back into the water, and Papa even taught him how to swim one time!_

_Running through the woods with his stick, Miles soon escaped the shade of the trees into a clearing, there was the lake, it was large with cat-tails and lilypads floating in its' murky water. Laughing he instantly went to the water edge and looked into the water with sparkling eyes. There he was, he looked down at his reflection, and smiled, waving. 'Hi me.' He said, reaching forward he touched the water gently and nodded to himself in quick approval. He looked like his father, minus the beard and mustach, he was a spitting image of him. Mason favored Mama, with long blond hair and light hazel eyes, and Mama was great, he loved Mama. But he was happy he looked like Papa._

_The day slipped by and soon the biting flies were replaced with silent masqetos, Mama was packing up dinner while Mason tried to catch the lightning bugs that taunted her, flickering their tail lights as they flew by her face. Miles liked the lightning bugs, they were pretty, and he was heading over to Mason, ready to tell her how to catch them. She had to wait for them to blink then lift her hand up underneith them like a landing pad for a plane._

_Someone put a large hand on his shoulder, and Miles turned around, looking into his fathers' face. 'Miles I need to tell you something.' He said in a hushed voice. Miles tilted his head a bit as Papa looked over his shoulder at Mama, he looked afraid. But Papa was never afraid. 'It's very important, so I need you to pay extra close attention.'_

_'Ok Papa.' Miles said._

_'I'm not sure how much longer I'll be around, you see...there are these very bad people, and they want to hurt...well...you need to look out for Mama and Mason if anything ever happens to me. Do you understand Miles." The boy nodded, his eyes were wide and Papa suddenly felt regretful._

_There was a silence, but it looked like Miles wanted to say something but couldn't get the words out. Papa stood up, and whipped his hands off on his pants, thinking that the conversation was over, but his son wasn't done, 'Is something bad going to happen?' He asked, his voice croaky._

_'I hope not.'_

_'If there is you'll be ok, because you're the greatest person in the world.' Miles said, and his Papa leaned down and wrapped his son in a hug. 'You'll always be there.' Unable to say anything he nodded against his neck, knowing it was all a lie._

_There was a loud banging, and Miles sat up in his bed, his eyes were blurry and he rubbed them to get the sleepiness away, his mother was sitting on his bed, Mason was pressed tightly to her chest and she was rocking back and forth, the moonlight streaming in from his window made the tears glisten on her checks. 'What is it Mama?' Miles asked with a yawn. There was a lot of noise coming from downstairs, were the dogs fighting again? That had happened before, it was really loud and had woke him up. But Mama hadn't cried when that happened._

_Mama reached forward and pulled Miles into her, rocking both him and Mason at the same time. Miles pushed away, his eyes were wide, and the fear consuming him. There was a scream from downstairs and Mason began to cry, Mama covered her mouth with her hand. 'Sh...it's going to be ok babies.' She whispered, her voice breaking._

_'Where's Papa?' Mason sputtered, Miles looked to Mama for an answer, but she didn't say anything. No one said anything for a long time. Eventually, the noises and screaming from downstairs had stopped._

_Mama stood up weakly, 'Get under the bed, and don't come out until I tell you!' Mama said, her voice was cold and mean, Miles didn't like it but did what he was told, hugging his sister. He watched Mama's feet as she moved slowly to the door and pulled it open a crack. Nothing happened. She opened the door open a little more, and she seemed to relax. Miles began to crawl out of the bed when she screamed and was yanked out of the room. There was a roar, like a lion, and a red liquid splattered one of the walls in his room._

_There was more thumping and screaming of someone being dragged down the steps, Miles buried his head into Mason's shoulder, trying to block out the sounds. So much screaming! He wanted to do something, but he couldn't he couldn't even move._

_Morning began to creep into the house, golden light filtering into the room, neither of them had moved from under the bed, the noises had stopped hours ago, no more screaming, no more banging or thumping. Miles began to inch himself from under the bed then, afraid, he dragged Mason after him, his heart was pounding, and Mason was at the point of tears. They both stood, arm in arm, and, unlike his mother, Miles kicked the door open quickly. It creaked as it swung out._

_The wood floor was slippery with more red liquid. Blood. Miles remembered when he had cut himself with a razor by accident, he had been bleeding, but Mama had put a bandage on it and kissed his forehead, making him feel better. The blood trail went all the way down the stairs, and the two siblings followed it, still holding each other in case one of them fell._

_The trail stopped in a large pool in the living room, and there, in the middle of the pool, was a body so badly mangled that Miles knew no bandage would ever fix this. Mason started crying then and began screaming, Miles was to numb with shock to do anything. He moved forward a bit, his bare feet were red now with the blood._

_It was Mama._

_She was laying on her back, her hazel eyes filmed over white so they were staring up at the ceiling, staring at nothing. Blood was dried under her nose, mouth, and there was even some under her eyes, like she had been crying tears. On her chest was a hand print, where most of the blood was coming from. 'Papa?' Miles shouted. His voice wavered and he felt sick, he needed to throw up, he needed to. Something was dripping onto his hair and he reached his hand to the back of his head, when he looked at it, it was red with the same liquid that had been covering the floors._

_He looked up slowly, and his eyes widened, there, pinned on the ceiling with knives, was Papa, the same hand print on his chest, over his heart, blood dripping from numerous wounds._

_Miles screamed._

* * *

><p>Miles woke up screaming, shaking he sat up in the bed, thrashing about wildly. His heart was racing and his eyes were wide. His screaming ceased but he couldn't stop the horror that was moving inside of him, that hadn't been a nightmare, he wished it had been, but it wasn't. It was a memory, one that he had locked away in the depths of his mind in an attempt to escape his past. But it had come back!<p>

He closed his eyes and tried to calm himself, he tried to forget, but once things that are buried once again become unearthed, they are very hard to hide again. Focusing, though, he managed to control his heart beat and listened to its' steady beating.

It sounded a light higher pitch than normal, and much less internal...

His eyes shot open and he looked at his surroundings, he was wearing only a pair of baggy light grey sweat pants that he knew he didn't own, he was sitting on a cover less bed that sat alone in a white walled and tan floored room. The beeping, as it turned out, had had something to do with his heart, a monitor sat beside the bed and Miles watched as the red line went higher and more jagged. At least he wasn't dead...but was that a good thing or a bad thing? Groaning, he lifted up his arms, and looked at the needles and IV's that were stuck in them.

Indignantly, he pulled them out, hissing at the pain as he tore them away from him. He put his hand on the metal that surrounded the bed and yelped as a large static shock coursed through him. He was still shaking as he jumped out of the bed, landing on the smooth floor he crouched down, a natural reflex, he stood up slowly, "Puppet?" He whispered. "Puppet?" He said louder.

He didn't get an answer and he hadn't expected one. There was a whistling sound and he jumped up in surprise, whirling around he saw a hole in the wall. There was no door, he didn't know how it had come into existence, but there it was. He wasn't sure what to do, he had never thought over a plan for 'a hole in a wall mysteriously appears' that had never been a worry to him. He stood there awkwardly before curiosity got the better of him and he walked to the doorless doorway.

As soon as he stepped into it, lights came on, it was a closet its' complete invatory was shirts, all the same size and the same color. Crimson red. He was really getting sick of that color.

Not seeing anything that told him not to take one, he lifted one of the hanger and walked out of the room, fighting to get his head through the hole. His arms screamed with pain whenever he lifted them higher than his shoulders but he managed to fight through the worse of it. There was another whoosh and he turned around to face where the closet was-well, had been, all there was wall. He knocked on where it had been, nothing. "This is weird..." He whispered. A loud beeping came from behind him and when he turned around, there was another hole, this ones' lights were already on and Miles could see that it lead into a hallway, white walls and cieling, tan floor.

"Good lord..." He said, peering into the hallway, "I'm in a mad house!" He began to laugh as if it was the funniest thing on earth. Hysteria. "Haha, I hope there are no clowns...god I hate clowns!"

His ankles cracked as he walked down the hallway, he muttered to himself about the craziness of this all, "Puppet, if you're playing a joke on me I'll kill you!" He said louder than he meant. His voice boomed as it echoed against the walls. "And, if you're not playing a joke, then I'm still going to kill you, because I think I'm going crazy!"

Finally, he ran out of hallway, and he turned around, ready to go back into the room he had been in, only to find that it had disapeared, only wall. He turned back, and there was a hole leading out of the hallway.

"Seriously? How do I keep missing this..." He muttered to himself before catiously walking out of the hallway into a large living room. He looked around in awe, the cieling was high and the floors were made from oak, there was a fireplace on one side of the room, though not in use it added to the splendor, and a large T.V. on the other. There were a couple of sofas and couches and the grandfather clock read 5:00 PM. He blinked. This was to good to be real, nothing in his life has ever gone right, so something was bound to go wrong here. Maybe this was all an illusion, or, more likely, the whole place was going to blow up. Caution flew into him, this had to be a trap, something was going to jump out and attack him, something was going to hurt him! Where was Puppet when you need someone sensibal to talk to?

"Don't worry Miles, this is not a trap." A voice said, and Miles snapped his head around, there was a man in a wheelchair wearing a grey turtle-neck, his eyes locked onto his. Behind him was another man, short and stocky with longer messy blue-grey hair.

Backing up, he grabbed the nearest thing to him, which just so happened to be a vase, he had to defend himself. "Who are you, where am I?" He grabbed the vase then, holding it tight behind his back. "What did you do with Puppet?" His voice esculating.

"The coyotes fine, better than best." The short man said in a gruff voice. It reminded him a lot of Puppet's voice, and he crossed his jaw, something he hadn't outgrown. "Now put the vase down." Miles glared, his heart was beating a little to fast, and he didn't trust these people, he didn't trust anyone anymore. Yet he obliged and put the vase back onto the table.

The wheel-chairing man rolled up in front of him and held his name out, "Miles Shepard, my name is Charles Xavier, welcome to my school." Miles looked at his hand, then up at his face.

"Where's Puppet?" Miles demanded again, narrowing his eyes.

Charles lowered his hand and replied with honesty, "He's in your room, up the stairs, sadly he hasn't come out from there since we brought you both here, despite all the attempts we've made to make him feel at home here." That seemed like normal behavior for Puppet and he relaxed, if Puppet did feel in danger, then he would have asked to be let out, and, if that didn't work, he would have found a way to escape. But how to know that this man wasn't lying? Miles had never been that good at judging people.

"Why am I here?" He questioned further.

"When we found you and Puppet, you both were badly injured." He said, rolling away, flicking a hand for him to follow, he was tempted to stay, but the muscular man had come up behind him, and horrifide, he followed. "Do you remember what happened that morning?"

He was now being lead down a hallway, doors were on both sides of the hall and Miles could hear music blaring from one of the rooms, Hot Mess by Cobra Starship. Small images of what had happened that morning and night made their way into Miles head as the small man banged on the door shouting above the music, "turn it down Corey!" Corey? Was that another kid? The music turned down a tad and they continued their walk down.

"Ugh...a bit...I remember me and Puppet had struck it big down at, um..." He stopped, embarrased at how he and Puppet had been hustling.

Charles raised a hand, "Don't worry I know all about your gammbling experiences, let's just say you were down at a club shall we?"

It made him tense when he heard that. How much exactly did this stranger know about him, and how? "Yeah, ok, we struck it big down at a club, and...we were in a park?" Miles rubbed his head, it was like a curtain blocked him from reaching that night. "Something, someone shouting woke me up and I went to check it out, Puppet didn't come at first, but then he followed. We were by a pond and there was a girl..."

"You mean Six?" Miles blinked in confusion, "She's a resident here."

More confusion came back to him, "Ugh...I guess..." He hurried so he could walk beside the wheel chair, "Is she ok? She was holding her arm like she was in pain, and I thought I remembered blood."

"Yes, she's fine, do you remember any more?" He asked.

Miles nodded slowly, releaved that at least the girl was alright, "Well, I remember that me and Puppet had started fighting these guys, and the girl-Six-started fighting too, she was actually really good, I mean, I was wondering why I was even there when she could defend herself so well..."

"Her power is Adoptive Muscle Memory, meaning all she has to do is see something being done and she can copy it."

They passed two girls, one with wavy brown hair and greenish brown eyes and one with shoulder length frizzy dark brown hair. They both stopped smiling as they passed him and Miles looked back at them as they walked by. "Who are they?" He asked.

"That was Bridget Olivia Hudson and Talia Rivkin, they both are also students here."

Miles blinked, "Whoa...students? Ok, where am I, what is this place? I know you told me this is a school, but, why am I here?" He inquired, "Are there people in all these rooms?" He asked, knocking on one of the doors. There was a 'hello?' as a response and Miles pulled away.

"Miles, this school is for people with gifts, talents, people like you come here to learn about their powers and learn how to control them." He nodded towards the other man, who had been trailing behind, " is one of the instructors here, he too has gifts." Logan flicked his hand and Miles' eyes widened as three blades protruded from between the knuckles, "I myself am a telopath."

He narrowed his eyes and balled up his fist, taking a few steps back. "What am I?"

There was no answer, Charles and Logan continued to go down the hallways and Miles reluctantly followed. "Your power Miles, is that you can control electricity which wouldn't be that unusual...if it wasn't for your bones."

"Bones?"

"Yes, bones." He turned his wheel chair around and held up a quarter, "Come here." Miles took a few steps forward so that he was directly in front of the man and his chair. Charles flipped the coin up out of his hand, in mid-air the quater changed direction and flew onto Miles arm, sticking there. He tried to pull the coin off, but it continued to press itself into his skin until he gave a pull with all his strength. There was a bloody imprint of it on his skin. Gripping his arm, he looked up at the bald man, his eyes pleading for an explanation. "When you first got here, we made the mistake of putting you in a catskan, not knowing that your bones were...special..."

"Special how?" He asked, his voice a little higher pitched than normal in shock and fear.

"When we put you in the catskan, your arms were ripped out of their sockets." Miles face went pale when he heard this, and he rubbed his shoulders. "We got you out of there as soon as we could and ran some tests to find that your bones actually have magnetic properties to them."

There was a long silence as Miles took this in, he didn't really know what to think, aside from he was a bigger freak than he had anticipated. Magnetic bones? That was unheard of, that was...**impossible**! Just as impossible as talking coyotes and powers. "This gives you extrodanary power Miles, it means you have control of electromagnetism, all the time, unlike most electricity controlers, who need to be around a magnetic field."

"Well kid?" Logan asked.

His legs suddenly felt very wobbly as he looked down at the bleeding impression, "I really need to see my coyote." He said in a faroff voice.

* * *

><p>The chilling wind blew ever so gently as Ar looked over at something in the distance, his eyes seeing something beyond the pollution of the park, something beyond the dark grey clouds bringing the promise of rain. He was seeing something out of this world, he was seeing the darkness that was inside of him, watching it move and cover the world. But on-lookers wouldn't know that was what he was seeing, they would think he was watching for birds or something of the sort. They will never be able to understand the ravenous murder that grew inside of them.<p>

"It is your move." A voice said, shaking Ar from his gleeful watch. He flicked his black-red eyes to the man sitting across from him. The man was wearing a dark tan trench coat, a matching rimmed hat covering his platnium blond hair, casting shadows down his face so that only his white eyes could be seen glowing out from the darkness.

Ar wore similar clothing, only his was dark brown, almost black, his eyes skimmed the checker board before him and he picked up a black piece, sliding it straight up the board in the middle, "I take the first move." He stated, his own glowing black eyes matching the white.

"You were never one to stratigize." The other man said, reaching a pale, almost translucent hand out and moving a white piece diagnolly to take up a side. "That was your fatal flaw." They both had the same thick Welsh accent to their voices, but the one mans voice was lighter, gentle to the ear and full of compassion, while Ar's voice was cold and metallic enough to cut through a person.

He gave a low chuckle and shook his head, "Brother, my only flaw is that I can not kill you, I can take your healing power, but nothing else." He moved his piece again, placing it in back on the one he had just moved. His brother didn't answer, just moved the same piece he had moved before forward. They went on that way for a while, until the white piece was trapped and jumped by the first black. "You can't expect to beat me like that by throwing one out and then having it be trapped and jumped."

The white eyed man only gave a swift nod and moved one more out front, this time he was able to sneak forward and, while Ar's pieces continued to push forward, he reached the end and got a king. The game ended when Ar couldn't move his pieces any longer, with none of the white eyed man's pieces being moved from the begining of the board, he couldn't get a king, or move.

"Strategy." The white eyed man said, staring into Ar's eyes.

Cursing in Welsh, Ar glowered and held his gaze, before the white eyes dropped and looked over the pond at the park. "You know destiny brother, and you know that this world is mine. Darkness is rising, I am darkness!" He hissed, "Not even your ghosts can deny that."

The other man didn't say anything for a while, "You seem to forget brother that there is always two sides, it keeps the world balanced, and, as long as there is darkness in the world, there will be light, there are always two sides."

"Just one side is destined to be greater than the other, and even in light there is darkness, in the shadows, but in the darkness, there is never any light, which side is greater then?"

"People will say the light."

"The people you are talking about is a couple of children, all with weak powers. I can sense them brother, and I will kill them, I will kill them all and feast on their powers." He turned his head to really focus on the other man, "You don't understand this, no one ever will, no one will ever understand this need, this hunger, the thrill of killing for strength." He smiled his cold smile and created a small little fire ball, "It is such a hunger...but you don't know about this sort of power, you are on the wrong side Ferthrya, you always have been."

* * *

><p>Behind this door they had said, will be Puppet, behind this door, will be your new room. New room? It might as well be, he wasn't going to be able to leave. Sure, they had given him the opportunity, there was nothing physically holding him here. But mentally, there was. The fact that he couldn't control his power, and that he had actually KILLED with his power, was something he couldn't forget. Sure the people had deserved it, but that didn't change the deed he had done. Murder was a crime, and criminals needed to be locked away, to be helped. He considered this place his help. "Go away!" Came the voice when Miles knocked on the door.<p>

"I'm coming in Puppet, you good for nothing coyote!" Miles shouted back he said, twisting the nob. Of course it wasn't locked, Puppet didn't have the opposable fingers to lock it.

The room was huge, and Miles couldn't stop his jaw from dropping, there was TV, he had never had a TV in his room before. Really, he had never had a room to himself before. There were two beds, one had been laid on already, no doubt by a certain coyote. There were two large windows overlooking the front of the institute. A night stand stood on the side of each of the beds, each one with a matching lamp on it and there were a few drawers with mirrors perched on top of them.

Sitting on a green carpet in front of the TV was Puppet, he didn't look any different from last time Miles saw him, the only difference was that he wore a bright red brace on his front leg. Miles remembered the gun shot and the pain that the coyote had been in.

"Miles is that...is that you?" Puppet asked, standing up on his long legs, he turned his head, his eyes showed confusion and Miles forced a laugh. "Wow...Miles...you look...you look...different..."

Now it was Miles turn to be confused, "What are you talking about?" He asked, dropping the bookbag the professor had given him and then walking over to the mirror.

He blinked, and the person in the mirror blinked back, but it wasn't him. "What the..."


	4. Chapter 4

_There is a new poll on our page concerning this, please check it out and use your vote!_

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><p>"Oh my god..." Miles said, the eyes in the mirror were wide with shock, just as Miles knew his eyes must have been, and, if it was possible, his face got even paler. "Who are you?" He said to the person in the glass. Its lips moved at the same time, he raised his arm, it raised its arm. Everything he did the reflection could mimic. "That can't be me."<p>

But Miles was forced to face the horrific reality, that that person in the mirror indeed was him. But he couldn't even recgonize himself. His face had kept the abused puppy look, his lip was still permantly split, and he still looked like he was five or six years younger than he really was. But that was as far as the similarites went. His whole face had been changed. His naturally red tan had been replaced with a pale extiror, and his hair was now stark white. The wide, twitching eyes were no longer black, they were silver, a coppery unnatural silver and, the scary thing, he lacked pupils. There was a bandage over his check and one eye was slightly blacked from the punch he had recieved from the fight.

Hardly able to pull away from the mirror, he slowly turned around to face a stricken Puppet. "Is that really you Miles?" The coyote asked in a soft voice. Unable to answer, Miles just nodded. Puppet randomly started to laugh hysterically, his laugh was something between a growl and a yelp, and Miles raised his eyebrows in confusion. "You look like a ghost or spirit or something!"

"Wow, great friend..." Miles muttered, no longer concerned for his friend's health he threw a pillow at him, it managed to hit him and smack him onto the floor. The coyote never stopped laughing.

Between gasps for breath he managed to chant, "Jasper, Jasper, Jasper the living ghost!" Miles glowered. '_Well, he's obviously seen to much TV since getting here.' _Miles thought. Picking up the back pack he had dropped on the floor, he flung it onto the unlaid on bed and started going through it. Puppet was slowly getting over his apperance and asked, "What's in there?"

"What I had on me when they found me, and a few cloths, he said once we get in the swing of things here we can go shopping." Puppet got a disguisted look on his face and sat down in front of the TV again. His ears were perked and his eyes glowing.

Wagging his thick tail he said, "I didn't know about magic boxes before I came here, they're amazing!" He said, "There's another magic box over there that plays noises, some of them are great but most of them are horrible." Puppet said, never looking up from the TV as he did. Miles peered past Puppet's head to see that he was watching a old TV show from the 80's called Happy Days. "This is so interesting, I keep on talking to them, but they can't seem to hear me...they just continue on with their own thing."

Miles sighed and shook his head, "Puppet, it's not a magical box, it's called a television and that over there is a stero." He muttered, looking over the clothes that they had given him. Three sweat pants, four tee shirts, and one sweater, when he opened up the sweater to look it over, two enevolpes fell, one onto the bed, the other one went unnoticed as it landed under it, stuch between two cracks in the floor. "What's this?" He whispered. Puppet flicked his ears, but was to wrapped up in the show to actually ask Miles what he was talking about. Flopping down onto the bed, he flipped it over. There was a red seal on the back, the impression on it was a pheasent, it's wings open and face pointed upward. He carefully picked the seal free, and the envolope folded open, four pictures dropped onto his stomach, and he sat up.

The first one was a picture of a family, his family. Papa was holding Mama's shoulders, and Mama was cradling a baby Mason in her arms. Miles' head was turned, smiling at something, or someone, out of the picture. They were all smiling, they were all laughing. A family.

He put that picture down quickly, not wanting to see how it had been, the next picture was a picture of the same pheasent that had been on the seal. It had been standing in a wheat field, its colorful wings open, its' head pulled back so it was staring up at the clear blue sky, as if it was praising the sky for something it had done.

The third one was in black and white. It was of Miles as a baby, two people were looking down at him, the one was his Papa, the other was a man he didn't know and had never seen before. Papa was smiling widely, his eyes sparkling as they always had been. The other man was also smiling, but not nearly as widely, he had a proud look, but nothing else. Who was he? Miles shrugged it off, maybe some uncle of Papa, his father had never talked about him having an uncle, but, then again, Miles was to young to really remember much of what his father had told him. Or he tried to forget.

The final one made his heart lunge to his throat, his hand began to tremble, and he threw it onto the bed as quickly as possible. He wanted to turn his head, but he couldn't move his eyes from the hideous picture. It was of his father, hanging from the cieling, face looking down, frozen in the horrifide expression, his eyes dead, the knives protruding from his wrists, ankles, and stomach, attaching him. There were red words written around it, written in a language Miles couldn't read.

"Hey, Miles, you ok?" Puppet asked, snapping Miles out of his fearful trance. He quickly grabbed all the pictures and put them under his pillow, Puppet was looking up at him, "You seem sort of out of it."

Miles gave another forced laugh, this one was shakier than he had hoped it to be, "Just looking at some things in my bag." Not a lie. He lifted up the new grey sweater, "Linkin Park, great band." He said when he saw what the logo and band name on it. That wasn't a lie either, he had once snuck into one of their concerts. He usually hated to listen to music, it was so usless, but he made an acception for this.

Puppet gave him a unbelieving look and Miles hoped off the bed to the window, "Look at all those people." He said, and Puppet stood on his hindlegs to see out the large windows.

There were boys and girls of all ages outside playing in the chilly middle fall weather, using their powers for play. A girl with unnatural bright red hair and a boy with thick, almost shoulder length, black-brown hair were huddled together looking over papers, the girl was making a small thorny-plant grow from the ground and the boy had a pink, glass, force field forming in the palm of his hand. The girl from the hallway, Talia, he thought her name was, was practicing karate off to the side. The girl from that faitful night, Six, was walking towards the other, and Miles sighed, they all had such good control of their powers. He didn't.

Which was why, when the professor asked, he had denied permssion to go back to school, one wrong move and he could fry someone. Kill innocent people. Walking with him, walking with his powers, was like walking next to a open circut. Besides, he had missed three years of school, he hardly knew how to do algebra, much less anything Highschool level. The professor didn't push it and had let the subject drop.

"It's only a matter of time before you can control your power." Puppet said, and Miles wondered how much of what he'd been thinking he said out loud. Or how much Puppet had been able to pry from his mind.

Sighing he asked, "Yeah, but then what?" He didn't believe he could control his power, if it was the same thing as it had been the night it had actually manifested, then he would never be able to control it. It would control him, and he would be defensless against himself. Literally, his own worst enemy.

"Then we'll leave here and pretend like we've never been to this place." Puppet answered. Miles smiled and nodded. That was a good plan.

The night was hard and sleepless for Miles, his eyes seemed to lack the ability to close as he stared up at the cieling, listening to Puppet's soft snoring in the other bed. Reaching under his pillow, he pulled out the pictures, looking at the one with the odd language on it, '_Dynged has ffordd chan yn arddangos itself fel a gwisgi t ddeall.' _He had a hard enough time with English, he knew that whatever was written in the red ink would forever remain a mystery. Putting the pictures away he flipped over and looked longingly out of the window.

The moon was out and full, casting long shadows into the room and giving everything an eerie illuminating look to it. The bed was too soft, he had been sleeping on the ground and park benches for the past few years, his body had become accustum to hard sleeping conditions and had forgotten what it was like to sleep in lesuire.

Careful not to make a sound, he slipped down onto the floor emmiting a soft sigh, this was more to his liking. His eyes began to close slowly, and he was just drifting off to sleep when there was a loud rattling. Instantly he was on his feet, the hairs on the back of his neck standing as he twisted around to find the source of the sound. Puppet yawned from the bed, "Miles...what are you doing on the floor?" He asked tiredly. Miles lifted a finger to his mouth, the banging was quieting, but someone, or something, was in the room. Puppet flicked his ears down, "Go back to bed you fool."

"You mean you don't hear that?" Miles asked in shock. Puppet always prided himself in having the best hearing of all canines.

In the shadow that the moon casted over the bed, Puppet's eyes glowed, and the pupils cirlced around as he rolled his eyes, "Of course I hear it, it's called heating, got me the first night too." The coyote answered coldly. No one woke him up without getting ripped apart. Weither by words or by teeth was the question. "You bummbling idiot, if there was real danger then I'd be the first one to sense it, now go to sleep."

Miles crossed his jaw and looked to the wall where the rattling was coming from. Heating, he had forgotten all about that. Awake from the scare, he knew that it would be impossible for him to control his nerves long enough to even begin to feel the pull of sleep. He sat back in the bed and looked at the TV. Peering over to the night stand, he saw the glowing buttons of the remote. There was an inner battle, one side wanting to ignore the TV, the other side wanted to fight the boredom settling over Miles, in the end, boredom was defeated and Miles quickly grabbed the remote before he could change his mind.

Flicking it on, he turned the volume down low enough that he could just barely hear it, Puppet grumbled something and turned so that he could sleep without having to see the flashes of the TV.

The first word he heard was electromagnetism and Miles suddenly found his whole being be sucked into the show that was on. _LOST, _he didn't know what was going on, but he knew that he couldn't stop watching. He chuckled lowly at some parts, teared up a bit (on the inside) at others, and, at some times, he was so totally lost in it that he forgot to breath. It was unhealthy, and he knew it, but, at the same time, it was the most educational show he had ever seen.

Electromagnetism was the main factor of the show in many ways. The island was basically one giant electromagnet, and when a plane went over it, there was blast of it that sent the plane spiraling down to the island. Then, it started going through time because of it, people died, a lot of people died really, and Miles felt fear grip at his heart. So many deaths.

Before he knew what was going on, the episodes were over, and Puppet was shaking himself up, Miles looked over to the window, some time during the night thick dark grey clouds had rolled in, showing the promise of a heavy storm. "Were you up all night?" The coyote asked, and Miles nodded, watching the end credits roll through the screen; not wanting to believe that it was really over. He had learned so much about electromagnetism, and the things he could do if he learned to control it. "What shows were you watching that captured your normally short attention?" He asked as Miles turned the power off.

"It was called _LOST _and you'll never believe what was on it!" Miles exclaimed, surprising himself at how awake he was. Not disappointed when Puppet didn't show his enthusiasm.

"Please enlighten me." He growled. After a quick stretch Puppet jumped off the bed and walked over to the window, nudging it open with his nose, he stared out at the clouds, ears pricked, listening, "No birds are out, this is going to be a big one." He said, hoping down.

Miles nodded quickly, "Electromagnetism, and you'll never believe what I might be able to do with my power." Puppet didn't answer, just pranced around the room a few times, "According to the show, invisibility, parallel universes, magnetic control, and, get ready for this...time travel!" He expected a little emotion from that.

He only snorted, "Yeah, but first, you've got to learn how to control your power, don't you?" Not even breaking pace as he circled around three more times.

"You always have a way of destroying every good thing in my life." Miles glowered. He went to the drawer and pulled out a pair of grey sweat pants and a black tee shirt. "Now, go away so I can change."

* * *

><p><strong>Elemental<strong>: _Ok, so, Helper wasn't here for part of this story, she isn't here right now actually, so, it's up to me to write this: in the next chapter, a lot of characters will be thrown in. From the last chapter, the character Cory Williams, who was listening to music in his room was submitted by SillyAndFree. The two girls who were walking in the hallways, Bridget Olivia Hudson and Talia Rivkin, were from Smileyface1967 and Cloudy-TheNightMarQueen. From this chapter though, the newly introduced characters this time is, the girl with the power of the plants, Chiara Lilith and the boy with the force field, Zachary Rowe were given to us by Kunnaki and Humour- Me Please.  
>Also, please don't just skim this looking for your character's name to pop up in this (they will appear), I use to do that, sometimes it worked, sometimes all I got was a lot of confusion. You will probably want to read all of this because there are a lot of things your characters will do that you won't understand if you don't read the whole thing...<br>Alright, enough of my ranting, before I leave you, I just want to say that the No Siders, Humans, and Brotherhood people will be coming in a few chapters, next chapter there should be mention of a lot of X-Men and The Breaking characters, possibly some No Siders, but I don't know._

**_P.S.-This chapter didn't turn out as well as I hoped._**  
><strong><em>P.P.S.-I do not own LOST (best show in the world) but it went well with the story and I wanted Miles to learn a few things about his power.<em>**  
><strong><em>P.P.P.S.-Miles Shepard's name is actually based off of two characters in the show LOST, Miles and Jack Shepard.<em>**  
><strong><em>P.P.P.P.S-You all need to watch LOST if you haven't seen it already<em>**  
><strong><em>P.P.P.P.P.S.-Ugh...man I forget, so, bye bye!<em>**


	5. Chapter 5

Peter O'Connell was well known on the streets for being a heartless fighting mutant; he stole whenever and from whomever and burned those who he couldn't stand to see. He was a loose cannon, someone who should be stopped and controlled, but couldn't be. He had servants who came to him with food and water, who brought him stolen goods and clothes. Peter was living the high life of a tyrant.

The living space he was dwelling was in a unused ware house, the floors were recently carpeted for Peter's pleasure. The bed was in the back, in the middle of the room though was a sofa or 'throne' as he called it, singed from all the times he had accidently set it on fire. This was where he was laying at the time, on his back so he was staring up at the large glass roof, shooting jets of fire from his hands.

_'Looks like rain today, I'm going to have to say in here...' _He thought to himself in annoyance. That was the downside of his power; he became incredibly weak when he got water on him.

There was a banging and commotion from the door, Peter didn't even look up to see who it was, he could handle anything that came at him. "Pyre!" A voice said. Since whoever it was, was calling him by his nickname and it was a male voice, it had to be either Darrel or Bryce.

Lifting his head up a tad he looked over to see that it was indeed the tattoo and piercing covered Darrel, one of his red eyes were twitching and he held up what looked to be a bird cage, his short black hair was swept back by wind.

"What did you find this time?" Peter yawned, sitting up lazily and looked over curiously at the cage. There was a little fluttering inside of the cage and then a high pitched female voice, talking a mile a minute. Darrel threw the cage at Peter, who easily caught it, there was a soft gasp from inside before the speaking started up again, peering through the wires of the cage, Peter's dark hazel eyes widened, "What the hell...a fairy?"

The thing inside the cage giggled and Peter looked back to it. It looked like a girl, skinny with pointy ears, no taller than six inches. She had small cloudy wings that looked liked like ones from a dragonfly she was flapping them, emitting a surprisingly strong current of wind. Her long blond hair was blowing around wildly and her blue eyes were huge.

"I found it at the outskirts of the city; it wouldn't stop talking the whole way here." He said, flopping down on the couch as Peter examined the cage, "It can create quite a strong gust of wind." Trying to fluff out his slicked back hair, proving his point.

The fairy thing stuck out her lower lip and placed her dainty hands on her hips, "Hey, my name is Anastasia Sokolov, and I'm not an 'it' I'm a girl, so don't call me it." Peter shook his head and the fairy smiled a wide smile, "You have a very nice place here, it's so big, I guess I should expect that from a dictator, huh?" Peter caste a glance to Darrel, who was too busy bringing to life a small statue of a horse to pay any attention. He had gotten his fill of the fairy thing on the walk to the warehouse. "Can I go now, I'm glad to meet you, I love meeting new people, oh, your hair is auburn, I love auburn hair, I wish I could have it but I got stuck with blond..." She went on to say more, much more, but Peter tuned her out.

"She's a little creepy." He muttered to Darrel. The pierced boy didn't reply, just reached down and petted the now alive marble horse that was cantering around the room, "And quit bringing all my statues to life!" Peter complained, shooting a flame at Darrel, who jumped back in surprise.

"Oh! That's not very nice!" The fairy said. Peter smiled wickedly and turned the flame to Anastasia, heating up the copper that made up the cage, "Oh, stop, that's too hot!" She complained, flapping her wings in an attempt to get away from the burning metal.

Darrel glared over at Peter, "Stop it." He ordered. Very few people could talk to Peter like that, but he made an exception for Darrel, who he thought to be the only person who could actually take him in a battle. That was the only reason why he stopped heating the metal and the fairy landed softly onto the bottom of the cage, "Remember your therapy." Darrel joked, and Peter glared back at him, the fairy laughed and instantly was back with her useless babble.

"You know, you really shouldn't be caging people up." An unrecognizable voice said, and all eyes turned to the shadows.

A girl stepped out into the light; she was on the taller side with long straight brown hair that had a reddish tint to it. She was wearing a long black sleeve top showing a little too much chest with a red Chinese looking corset, black leggings and black boots. "It's not nice." She said and gave a fierce smile. Looking into her almost black eyes, Peter could see the coldness built up in them.

Evil.

He lifted up his fist, which were engulfed in the fire he had formed on them. "Who are you." He snarled, dropping the cage onto the floor, Anastasia climbed out of the now smashed door and flew away. Peter didn't care.

"My name is Ava Fontana, Peter, and, who's that, is that Darrel Hodder?" She peered over Peter's head and looked to Darrel. Her voice had a little something to it, Italian or French, Peter couldn't tell the difference and, in all honesty, he didn't care. "Good, Ar will enjoy me bringing into two people for his cause."

Peter wearily looked back at Darrel, who gave a quick nod. Shouting he flicked his wrist and threw a ball of fire at Ava's head. She easily dodged and jumped onto a stack of crates, landing on all fours like a cat. She gave a cocky smile and tilted her head, "You can't pull any tricks on me." She said, dodging another fire blast.

Suddenly, there was a sound, something half between a caterwaul and a scream, and Peter was thrown back into a pile of crates, groaning, he looked up. There was another girl in the room, her arms were crossed as he glared at Peter with glistening brown eyes. Was she a wolf? She defiantly had a coat of light grey, pointed ears, and a thick tail, yet, she stood on two legs and had a human like face.

"Oh, this is my partner, Dakota, Dakota, this is Peter and Darrel." She said, the smile never leaving her face. The wolf girl only nodded and stared at him with those piercing eyes, he forced himself up on his feet and looked over at Darrel.

His focus was on a picture, and Peter smiled when he saw what the picture was of, ghosts, perfect. A wind suddenly blew into the warehouse and a chill went down Peter's spine, the two girls looked around in confusion, suddenly, the wolf girl yelped and started to slash around in the air, smacking herself as the ghosts in the picture attacked her. She howled her sonic howl, but she couldn't get the apparitions away.

The other girl, Ava, was knocked off of the crates she had so proudly perched herself on top of, and Peter hit her with a jet of fire as she rolled around on the ground. He ran forward, ready to smack her in the face with the fire, Darrel was now looking to something else to bring to life, and he decided on a granite statue of a almost life sized tiger.

When coming to life, the first thing to animate was the eyes, they shown and gleamed red, just as red as Darrel's, and then the rest of the body began to click together. Its' shoulders rolled and it roared a scratchy roar before charging at Dakota. The wolf girl was just picking herself off of the ground when the tiger smashed into her side, throwing her onto the ground and wrapping one rock jaw around her wrist. She yelped and then, right in its' face, she howled. The tiger was shattered apart, but Darrel had expected this, and before Dakota could pick herself up, one of those fancy smooth black marble greyhound statues was charging at her.

Meanwhile, Peter was having a little trouble with Ava, despite the new burns on her leg, she was still quick and strong, agile like a cat, she got behind him and...bit him? The bite was strong and placed on his shoulder, he tried his best to throw her off, but fell onto the ground. Reaching around with a burning hand, he managed to press it against her waist, burning into the skin like a brand.

Screeching, she let go, and jumped backwards to avoid being hit with a jet of fire. There was a banging behind them, and Peter watched as Ava's eyes widened. He whorled around and his eyes widened.

There was a man standing at the doorway, his whole appearance was black, except for two glowing red embers in his eyes. Two people stepped from the back of him, their appearances were much more noticeable. One was a young girl with dark auburn red hair and piercing emerald eyes. The other was a boy with slicked back dark brown hair and dark green eyes. "Who are you!" Peter demanded, his voice was a little shaky, and he raised his hands up, blue flames shooting up from them.

The man just flicked his hands and Peter was flying through the air, smacking into the wall with a loud bang. He looked up at the man and tried to stand, but his legs failed him and he fell back onto the ground. "Pathetic, all of you." The man said in a thickly accented voice, the red eyes darted around and Dakota and Ava both dropped their heads.

Darrel suddenly charged the three newly introduced people, and the little girl raised her hands, Darrel dropped to the ground. Laughing to herself, she flicked two fingers up, Darrel's arms raised, she flicked two fingers on her other hand, and his legs flew up in back of him, he actually smacked himself in the back of the head. The man placed a large hand on the little girls' shoulder and muttered something to her. Upset she rolled her eyes and dropped her hands, Darrel crawled a little way before flipping himself over to look at the people. "Who are you?" He choked out.

The man didn't answer directly, only said, "My name is not of your concern as of right now; my business though, is something else." Peter had forced himself onto his knees, breath heavy; he waited for the man to go on. "We are The Breaking, I...recruit...mutants like you to join and fight our cause."

"And what cause is that?" Darrel snarled, his eyes blazing with hatred.

Ar smiled, "Power, control, the normal." He was staring at Peter when he said that, and the boy could honestly say that he was intreged by this. "You both are weak with your powers, I can guarantee to you that you can learn how to use your full potential if you come join The Breaking."

Darrel was slouching over, but he straightened himself out, "No deal." He growled.

The man shrugged and looked at Peter, who turned his head to Darrel then back to the mystery man, he was tempted to just agree with Darrel and say no deal. It seemed like he'd be selling his soul should he join. Yet power...power...and control...that was a good bargain to make, he nodded slowly, "I'll join."

Ar nodded, "Smart boy, now, to show you what would have happened had you declined my request." He said, a hideous smile forming on his face as he walked over to Darrel. The boy struggled with his super strength as the man approached him, yet even his strength was lost on the man. With a smile full of mockery, the man reached down and placed his hand on Darrel's chest, Darrel's screams echoed and Peter backed up, eyes wide with horror. What had had he just done?

* * *

><p>There was a knock on Miles door, and he groggily went to answer it. The lack of sleep had finally fell upon him shortly after changing, and he was suffering from it. "I'm coming, I'm coming." He muttered as he pulled the door open.<p>

A Caucasian girl was standing there, a wide white smile on her face. She was taller than him with black hair in a pixie cut, her ears were pierced several times and she was wearing glasses. "Hi, my name's Quinn, but everyone calls me Quinny." She said warmly. Miles blinked several times and looked back into the room at where Puppet was staring at himself in the mirror, talking to himself. "You're Miles, the new guy, right?" She asked.

"Oh, yeah, I'm Miles..." Miles said cautiously. It was seven in the morning; he didn't think that anyone but him woke up this early. "Can I help you?" He asked.

She gave a little laugh and Miles blinked. "No, I'm here to help you, the professor wants me to help you get into the way we do things here. Since it's Saturday, we don't have school but we do have a danger room assignment, but you'll just be watching us; first is breakfast." It took Miles cloudy mind a few seconds to understand everything she said, but he found himself nodding. "Great, I'll wait out here until you're ready, you're going to love everyone here Miles, is it true that you really have a coyote?"

"Yeah, he's, right in here..." He said slowly, ducking back inside of the room. "Puppet, there's a girl out there that's going to be helping us learn how things function here."

"I heard." The coyote muttered before sighing, "I guess we can't hid in the room forever." He got off of the dresser that held the mirror and stood beside Miles, "Well, are we going to get this over with or not?" He muttered.

Miles was tempted to say or not. He was right when he said that they couldn't hide in the room forever, but Miles wasn't in a peppy mood this morning. Gathering his wits, he opened the door; Quinn was standing there, still smiling widely. "Oh my god! You do have a coyote, hey there!" She exclaimed, getting on her knees she rubbed Puppet behind the ears and Miles could hardly stifle a laugh.

"Get. Off. Of. Me." Puppet snarled, taking deep and uneasy breaths.

The girl raised her hands to her mouth, "They told me he talked...but I didn't believe them, that's so cool." The annoyance was just radiating off of Puppet, "Alright then, come on, we don't have that much time before the danger room, and I don't feel like being yelled at by ." She said, turning around and walking quickly down the hall, Puppet glanced up at Miles with cold eyes.

"She annoys me." He spat.

Miles smirked, "Really? 'Cause I'm beginning to like her." Puppet rolled his eyes and muttered something about how he was a shallow-pathetic-moronic dormouse.

* * *

><p><strong>Helper: <strong>_Hope we didn't overwhelm you with all the new characters today, a lot of them were actually in the story and there will be more in the next chapter too. Probably only X-Men submitted ones though.__  
><em>**Elemental: **_Let us see, in this chapter we had Peter O'Connell given to us by 3rdbase101...__  
><em>**Helper: **_There was a quick mention of Bryce Woods who was submitted by Capricorn66 (don't worry, he's going to have a bigger part later on) and then Darrell Hodder by Another Dead Hero.__  
><em>**Elemental: **_The awesome fairy person Anastasia Sokolov, who Morumotto-chi graciously let us use.__  
><em>**Helper: **_Jeez, almost forgot about The Breaking characters there. Ava Fontana was submitted by OpenSesimy, Dakota Shade by S.G., the little girl puppet master, Tanya Westerly was by Sexy Malfoy!__  
><em>**Elemental: **_We already said that Legion was submitted to us by Raimaru13, are we forgetting someone?__  
><em>**Helper: **_Yeah, Quinn Delmond, we just wrote about her...__  
><em>**Elemental: **_Oh, yeah, duh! She was given to us by Stormynightengale.__  
><em>**Helper: **_Yeap.__  
><em>**Elemental: **_Holly macaroni, we used a lot of characters today…Oh yeah, also, if your characters personality seems a little…off…we're sorry, we really are trying our best here.  
><em>**Helper: **_One more thing that we need to clear up, Darrel doesn't die, don't panic Another Dead Hero, he has Healing abilities, so Ar can kill him, but he won't stay dead. _


	6. Chapter 6

Miles had always been distant from people, Puppet even more so, both being socially awkward, Miles knew they were going to be in for a long day. "Alright here's the kitchen." Quinn said, turning around and saying seriously, "Warning: if Kitty cooked something, don't eat it." Before Miles could get in a question Quinn thrust the door open, "Hey guys, new recruits." She said happily, walking into the room.

"We can always run." Puppet put in. They both stood staring at the door as it slowly began to swing close, "Well, after you." Puppet said, taking a large step backwards.

Miles shook his head and laughed, "No, no, you know the old saying women and animals first." He signaled for Puppet to go.

"Yes, and when have you ever been one to follow the graces?" Puppet snarled. "Now get going!" Crossing his jaw, he bit his upper lip and nodded, taking a deep breath. "Get on with it!" The coyote said, smashing his head into the back of the boys knee. Miles stumbled but caught himself, managing to get into the kitchen with some dignity. When he saw the people in the room though, he could feel the color drain from his face and his eyes widened.

Something about more than two people staring at him caused all the confidence to just drain out of him, which was why when dealing with gamblers he always let Puppet do the talking. It had been this way for as long as he could remember, and it wasn't because he was shy, but because his mind always began to work at racing speed. He couldn't form the words as fast as his mind could and he began to stutter horribly, and he wondered what the people were thinking of him, only adding to his nerves.

"I-I..." He began, only to have to stop, but the only problem was that his I's didn't stop, they just continued to stutter out of his mouth, "Miles." He croaked. Glances were exchanged around the room and then their eyes were back on him.

He could feel Puppet move forward to stand beside him, and the eyes shifted to the coyote. Miles let out a breath that he didn't know he had been holding, then he began to mentally slap himself. He had to get control of himself, they were just people, _'You look more like a idiot when you stutter and go pale than you do when you just talk.' _His father had told him.

Thankfully though, Quinn introduced them, "Guys, this is Miles and Puppet." There were a few grunts of hellos and welcomes, and Miles forced a smile.

A large but short guy with blond hair pulled back into a pony tail stood up, "Hey, my name's Cory." He said putting on a goofy grin, "and this is my friend Dakota, or Grizz." He said, flicking a thumb behind him. The guy he was pointing to was someone Miles couldn't believe he hadn't noticed before. Miles and him had to both be the same age, but this guy dwarfed him, standing at least 6'7", heavily muscled and medium lengthed black hair. Grizz barely gaved him a glance, just continued to eat a plate of eggs and ham.

Miles nerves had kicked in again, and his neck suddenly seemed to big and his back was beginning to sweat despite how cool it was in the kitchen. Other people were introducing themselves to him now and he had to force himself to listen. Though he was also fighting not to collaspe.

Not counting Cory, Dakota, and Quinn, there were four other people in the room. The two girls he already knew, Bridget and Talia, were there, and Quinn told him that Talia was deaf, and that Bridget could read/speak/sign any language. A boy to small and to slim for his age with black hair and grey eyes named David was hanging around in a corner of the kitchen, his back leaning against the wall and a plate with eggs in his hands. The final person was Six, she was smiling at him in warm welcome, but her eyes were staring daggers into him, only adding to his hoarseness.

"So...what's your power?" Cory asked excitedly.

Fighting for the words that stumbled over his mouth he said, "Electromagnetism." Welling up with pride when there was no stuttering, "My power is electromagnetism." He said, feeling more comfortable and confident as he said it. Cory blinked in confusion and Miles sighed, "Power over electric and magnetic fields." The larger boy opened his mouth in an 'oh' but Miles could tell that he wasn't really getting what he was saying.

"Does the coyote have a power?" Grizz asked in a deep voice, staring at Puppet with dark brown eyes. Puppet looked right back at him, it was like two animals facing off.

"I speak, isn't that enough for you people?" Puppet asked in monotone, his eyes flickering in annoyance as he said it. Walking over to the table he hoped up onto a chair and onto the table. There were a few shouts of disapproval, which the coyote shook off with a flick of his ear, and he began to eat what was left on the platter of eggs and ham. When everyone in the room started to protest loudly he said, "I'm a coyote, and I swear if you touch me I will kill you all in your sleep."

No one doubted the candor in his voice and let him eat in peace, though glances were cast at him as he continued to vigorously devour the food. "Don't worry Puppet, I'm not hungry." He muttered grumpily.

"I never was worried." Puppet said when he was finished. His snout was covered in syrup and he flicked his tongue over his muzzle to rid his fur of the sticky liquid.

Dakota and Cory were both glaring at them, their hunger obviously not quenched. Quin had her hand over her mouth to force back though Miles could hear her giggling. David was smiling slightly while Talia and Bridget just shook their heads. The coyote hopped down from the table and Miles sat down a little awkwardly beside Six. "So, what's this...danger room?" He asked. Moans chorused around the room, Puppet and Miles exchanged worried glances.

"I'm still sore from last time!" Bridget complained, dropping her head onto the table dramatically. Talia shook her head in solemn agreement and signed something that, of course, Miles couldn't understand, but the others all groaned at something she said.

David spoke up from the back of the room, "These sessions help us learn to fight and control our powers." He walked forward a bit, but kept his distance from everyone else. All eyes were turned to him in disbelief and he shrugged before going back to lean against the wall, muttering lowly to himself, Puppet smiled, able to hear everything the boy was saying.

"Well...what are they?" Miles asked again, curious.

Quinn sighed, "David's right, they do teach us how to fight, but they're so hard!" Everyone murmured yes, "It's a simulation but there's real lazars and the guns shoot paint balls; we have to defeat it as fast as we can for practice."

"Sometimes there's holographs." Talia said. Being deaf hardly affected her speech, it was a little more hoarse and strained than most people's, but it was-thankfully-softer and better sounding than Puppet's. Cory looked down at his watch, it was a digital with a silver face and a black band. _'That's a Rolex, running a minute and twenty-three seconds late.' _At the time, the thought seemed so natural, what watch it was; how late it was running. But afterwards Miles wondered how he knew.

"Looks like you guys are going to be late." Cory said with a smirk before, in a flash, he was gone, leaving in his wake only a gust of wind. Shocked, Miles whorled around, he knew that Cory was gone, but couldn't help it. The boy was overweight for his age, yet, he had the power of superspeed...he would have never guessed.

Six stood up and groaned, "If he keeps doing that, I'm going to have to cut off his legs." She muttered, trying desperately to fix her dyed red hair. "Come on, we don't want to skin us alive." Six said, giving up on the mangled mess that Cory had left of her hair and walking out of the door.

* * *

><p>"Oh...that looked painful..." Miles said, flinching away from the window. Puppet was chuckling lowly as Talia tried to flip away from a drone, but was splattered with red paint.<p>

The coyote looked up at Miles, "This is the most entertaining thing I've seen since coming here." He put his front paws on the glass and howled out, "Come on! Die already! DIE!" Logan and Miles both looked over at him in concern, but the coyote didn't notice, just wagged his tail happily.

They had been lead to the other side of school, then underground, to where the Danger Room was located. Logan had chewed them out for being late, and as punishment the session would last longer. Puppet and Miles were to stay with Logan in the control room and just watch and get the hang of things. Puppet instantly began to root for the wrong side, cheering when the X-Men were hit by the paint and booing when they escaped.

"You're rooting for the wrong side there wolfie." Logan growled, rubbing his head with his hand. It turned out that the magnetic field in Miles gave 's headaches. Mainly since the claw-man had metal bones.

Puppet flicked his ears down and turned his head to the side, showing one eye he glared evilly. Puppet had changed a lot ever since coming here, it had only been three days and Miles was already noticing it. He was even more agitated than usual and his attitude was darker and crueler.

It was just a phase Miles told himself; the coyote just needed to adjust to life here.

There was a commotion from inside the Danger Room and Miles turned just in time to see Dakota knock a robot out of the air. Dakota, whose appearance looked bear like when human, could turn into a actual bear. He looked like a Giant-short-faced (an extinct species that Miles had done a report on when he was younger) but had a hump and bulk like a grizzly. Simple definition: he could kick major ass when it came to fighting. "Boo, come on, can't these robots fight any better?" Puppet snarled, clawing at the window. Miles stepped away from his fight-crazed friend.

Everyone was down their fighting, but only Cory, Grizz, Six, and Talia could do real harm against the flying and crawling metal monsters. Since they didn't have feelings, or pasts, David and Quinn were both at lost, then there was nothing for Bridget to translate, there wasn't much they could do aside from use their powerless fighting tactics.

The fight lasted for three hours, the ending results weren't good. Everyone on the X-Men team had been hit, and, much to Puppet's delight, the robots had captured the leader, a holographic Charles Xavier. Logan was on a rage.

Miles stood back awkwardly as he chewed them out on things they should have done but didn't, about how if that was real they'd be lying in a ditch dead and so on and so fourth. Miles sort of tuned him out. The edges of his vision were blurring a bit and he blinked a few times, everything was getting fuzzier, he rubbed his temple and shook his head. The only time he had ever felt like this was when Puppet slipped him a beer instead of a water, stupid coyote.

Suddenly, he was out of the Danger Room, out of the institute. The sky was a dark grey, thunder bellowed from its stomach and small splatters of rain fell onto him. Before him lay the lake he had been with his mother and his father, and with Mason. But the lake had changed. The grasses were now overgrown, and the three trees that had once been on its banks were now either leaning into the water, or gone.

"Changed a lot hasn't it." A voice said, and Miles jumped.

Standing beside him was a man he had never seen before, yet looked vaguely familiar, his hair was white along with his eyes, and he had a flicking look to him, like he may disappear at any time. "Who are you?" Miles asked, backing up a few paces, the man turned to him with a small, sad, smile.

"You don't remember me?" He asked, shaking his head in defeat and sighing deeply. Miles blinked in confusion, "I'm a friend Miles Shepard, not an enemy, there is no reason to be afraid." Miles was ready to throw in a few hundred questions, but the man stopped him by answering all of them, before he even asked, "I'm sorry I can't tell you who exactly I am or how you got here, and what connection we have with each other, I'm taking a risk with bringing you here even for this short amount of time." The man said, walking forward.

Cautiously, Miles followed, "A risk from...what?"

"Oh, this encounter might wreck the time/space continuum, shred apart the fabric of the universes and end all life from existence." By the end of that Miles jaw had dropped down and his eyes were wide in shock and fear. "But don't worry about it, I'm certain everything will be fine-probably..." That wasn't exactly the reassurance that Miles was looking for.

The man stopped suddenly, causing Miles to almost run into him, but the guy hardly seemed to notice, just picked something off of the ground and brushed it off. Miles didn't get to see what it was. "Why am I here though?"

"Because everything's going to change, and I'm afraid I can't stop it." The man replied in irritation, "Now can you just let me continue?" Miles gave a swift nod, "Good." He began to walk again and against his better judgement, Miles followed in short pursuit. "Everything is soon to change, everything you've learned will be put to the test, the world will be torn in half, millions will die, and trusted brother will fight trusted brother." He said, sighing and walking to the overgrown banks of the lake, the plants disappeared from before him and he reached down, dipping his finger into the water. It rippled and he seemed to stare into it for ages before looking up to Miles with now hard eyes, "The question is: will you be ready for it?"

Miles forehead creased as he heard it, and the man looked at him again, "Will you be ready to have life torn away from you, will you be ready to be called a liar, a traitor, a _murderer _by those who you love the most? To be hated and to be feared." No. "Well you better get ready."

The man stood and Miles realized just how tall he really was, looming over him like a tree, he reached down and forced open Miles hand, placing in his hand the object that he had picked up. Miles peered down at it. It was a tiny toy lion. The silver paint had fading off, the eyes once painted black now lacked all visible color and dirt was packed into every place possible.

_Mason._

This was her toy, she had lost it the evening they went to the lake, the eve of their parents murder.

He looked up to the man and saw that he was fading quickly, the only thing vivid on him was now his shining white eyes. The lake was gone, leaving only a black void, _'The game's changing, what will be your move?' _The man's voice whispered in his head.

"Miles, Miles!" His eyes shot open and he looked around, he was back at the institute, Puppet was glaring up at him in concern. "You alright?" He asked.

The only thing Miles was capable of doing was nod, and final hissing out a soft, "Yeah." Though it was weak, Puppet seemed good with it, and turned back around to listen in joy at Logan lecturing the other mutants. Miles looked down at his hand, and there it was, in real life, the toy lion.

_Mason._


	7. Chapter 7

There has always been people who decide against fighting, who do not choose a side; thinking they can avoid confrontation. Yet it will always find them, fights can not be avoided and will always come around. It is a part of life. Times will eventually come when you will be forced to choose in the age old battle of good vs. evil, darkness vs. light. The times come at different moments for everyone, and everyone will have their own reasons to choose which side they will fight for.

One boy will choose darkness because of the hunger that comes with greed and power, while another will risk the chance of death if it means that he will die in the assurance that he is not casting the earth on a ever increasing downward spiral of morals.

However, for the ones whose times have not yet come, whose sides are still not chosen, their lives lack all fulfillment and security. Fear is holding these people back, fear of the unknown, fear that the side they choose will lose and that they will die in the process. Some call them cowards, those who call them that are neither wrong nor right, wrong as it is that they have full faith that the side that they're on will win when it could very well be that they are losing, but they're to blind to notice. Right because fear is holding them back and unless forced they can't break the bonds that are holding them.

Some of these people have already changed the course of this story, their choices sealing their destiny. Peter going to fight with Ar and Darrel deciding to take the pain of death. Anastasia choosing to run instead of fight, and the lynx girl in the beginning for taking a beating yet not harming the people who were tormenting her. Not all lives are connected, sure, a little boy in Africa may never know the little girl in Asia, or a little dying woman may never know the little boy being born in the room beside her. But who's to say whose story is more important, who has the rights to say that one person is better than another. Farmer vs. President, who is more important? A leader of men, yes, that's important. But what good would leadership be if there was no food in which to feed everyone? Without one, the other would not live, and the same is that in this; everyone will be connected, every character has a part to play, one part that if it had been altered just a tad, would have prevented a chain of events. The butterfly affect, if you step on one butterfly, your house will burn down in later years.

We must look at all the characters as a whole, and to do so, we must look in the most unlikely places at the most unlikely people.

Rina didn't have a power, she wasn't a mutant, she was just a normal human. Normality, normal was anyone who wasn't a freak, who wasn't a mutant, before all this, normal was something no one could achieve. Everyone was different, every one having a bit of crazy in them. Before the truth about mutants were revealed, she was considered a little abnormal, her looks were the same, but she was punk and hardcore, not like everyone else, she stood out in a crowd.

Now, she was just a face in the crowd of other normal humans.

The wind was picking up, and small drops of rain that had been falling were beginning to fall more quickly and were becoming larger. She pulled the hood on her jacket up and cursed herself silently for not bringing an umbrella. Already she could hear the soft booming of thunder just beginning to form, and the sky cast across the occasional flash of light.

Before she had saw the storm coming, she had been walking to her friend's house, the whole world may be falling apart, but lord help her if she missed a 'date' with Joey. His house was still a mile away, her house two, and she knew she couldn't make it in the storm that was brewing, but she was in New York, and it would be no problem finding a place where she could wait out the storm. The problem would be finding one that wasn't already harboring mutants. It wasn't that she didn't like mutants, she didn't mind them at all, but the ones that lived around here tended to be a little harsher, and a little more ready to harm...and even kill...

There was another flash of lightning, and a roar of thunder, loud enough that it shook the earth. With that the clouds just opened up and began to unleash their wrath upon the earth. Jumping at the sudden downpour, Rina hurried to one of the roosts in front of an old building, it was to old and shouldn't be lived in, but it was. Rina had walked this way many times to get to Joey's house, a few blocks down there was a club, Rina had gone in their once with Joey, who had been friends with the guard, and Rina had regretted going in their ever since.

Leaning back on the door, she pulled her jacket tighter around herself, wind seemed to be blowing from every direction, blowing freezing rain into the roost and chilling her even more. There was a loud hissing from behind her and she whorled around, coming face to face with the thing she had been hoping to avoid when she chose this spot, a mutant. This one's' mutation was noticeable; she had lynx ears on the top of her head, like one of those Japanese Anime things. The girl looked to be about 13 years old and was glaring at her with cold grey eyes, she was wearing only a pair of loose jeans and a tee shirt and there was a bright orange cast around her arm. Rina scooted back in surprise, but the girl made no move to attack her, only asked in a hoarse/scratchy voice, "Who are you?"

"Rina." She answered truthfully, taking a careful look over the girl. She seemed to find this true and eased up; letting out a breath of fresh air she gave a cat like smile and nodded her head, meowing in hello. Rina blinked in surprise at how easy it was to gain her trust, "Um...who are you?" She asked.

The girl tensed a bit again, but relaxed, Rina could almost see the gears turning in her brain, deciding whether or not to tell her the truth. But, in the end she did, "My name is Mayura McCabe." She said, the hoarseness in her voice was no replaced by a purr, her eyes were no longer cold but shinning as she said it before going serious again, "Why are you out here?" She asked.

Rina thought about what to say, realizing that if she was found associating with a mutant she would be shunned, and she also realized that she was fine with that, "Well, me and my boyfriend, Joey, always hang out on Saturday's, so I was heading over there...he's going to kill me for missing out on it." She sighed and shook her head. Joey was ridiculous, if she missed a date, he would never let it go, even when she was visiting her grandmother in the hospital after a car accident; and he hated mutants. He hated them with a burning passion, though they never did anything to him. The thought of him seeing her talking to Mayura made her smile a bit. Before a blast of freezing rain forced her back into a cold reality, "So, ugh, how about you?" She asked, whipping her face with her wet sleeve, "Why are you out here alone, wearing clothes for warm weather?"

"I don't wanna talk about it." Mayura replied sadly, resting her head sadly on her knees and staring blankly out at the rain. Rina decided it was best not to push it any further. "We need to go someplace else, it's too cold here." The rain was beginning to blow more forcefully into the roost and Rina nodded in agreement before asking if she knew a place to stay. The girl nodded cheerfully, "Yeah, there's a group of warehouses right past that alley on the other side of the street, but..."

"But what?"

"Well, one of the warehouses is where Peter lives, and Peter is really, really mean, I'm afraid that we'll walk into the one with him by accident." She said in slight annoyance. Of course Rina had heard about Peter, she didn't know anyone who didn't. But, it sounded funny in her mind, but she always thought it was suppose to be a myth. There was no real evidence of him, they robbed and did their thing under the cover of night, and if they are real, they left no witnesses.

This was a hard decision, they couldn't stay here, it was too cold and to windy, they could go to these warehouses and be warm; either by the warehouse itself or by the fire that Peter has been said to create. In the end, warmth was too much of an offer, "We'll go to the warehouse, we'll be careful though, I mean, if we see the first sign of trouble we'll get out of there."

Mayura nodded and stood up, shaking herself off like a cat and looking over at the falling rain, sighing and muttering about how she hated water, she darted into the storm, and Rina followed in short pursuit.

It shocked her, how strong with wind and the rain was how it hurt when it touched her skin, like a million tiny razors slashing through her, it was freezing, not to the point to where it would become sleet or hail, but close. Her jacket gave her little to no protection from it's' force, and she had lost sight of everything but Mayura's bright pink tee-shirt. They had to be at the alley way by now, not that it would matter, since the rain was falling straight down as well as side to side.

Suddenly the pink shirt stopped, and Rina had to stop suddenly, sliding in the mud to avoid crashing into her. "This door is open!" She heard Mayura shout over the rain, and Rina pushed Mayura into the warehouse. She followed, spitting out water as she slammed the door close, blinking, she looked over at Mayura and smiled, giving a thumbs up.

"Is anyone here?" She called out, Mayura flashed a worried look, but there was no answer. Even though she doubted that someone would answer if they wanted to kill them. That wasn't Peter's style. "I don't think anyon..." There was a low groan and both girls jumped; Mayura latched onto Rina's arm in fear, and Rina raised her finger to her lips, quietly shushing her. There was another groan, this one more aware and pain sounding. Rina took a few cautious steps forward, looking over to her side she saw the light switch and she flicked it on.

The lights in the warehouse came on slowly, one row after another flickering unsteadily before finding a strong current. The whole storage area became illuminated, boxes, paintings, statues, even an old car, everything everyone didn't feel like keeping in their apartments probably went here. Slowly and quietly walking around the first set of boxes, Mayura grabbed tighter hold of Rina's arm.

"I smell blood." She whispered her large grey eyes wide and worried.

Gulping, lost for words, Rina nodded, she felt the need to get the hell out of there! But there was also the need to check out what was going on, maybe a person had just gotten caught under some falling boxes. Maybe it was an old hobo named Ragoff, just searching for refugee from the rain and sleeping. Ha, that would be nice...

They came to a large clearing in the box, and Rina's heart sunk, this would be no hobo, this place looked like a warzone!

There was the remains of what might have use to be a couch, scorch marks covered the ground and the walls, some even on the ceiling. Small crimson spots covered the carpet by it, making Rina's heart lurch in horror. Boxes were smashed in, everything was a mess, and, in the corner of it all, as if to complete the war like appearance of the place, was a body. Breathing, living, but almost dead. Mayura pulled her arm back and shook her head, but Rina gave her best attempt at a brave smile and continued to walk forward.

_'This is crazy! I could get myself killed; I probably am going to get myself killed!' _She thought to herself as she advanced toward the moaning body, Mayura had hung back, afraid of what could happen. Inching forward ever so slowly, she came to the person.

It was a boy, maybe eighteen years old, a year older than her. Even curled up she could tell that he was tall and thinly muscled. He had scruffy short hair and a small beard, and tattoos covered most of his body, and what wasn't covered by tattoos was covered by piercings. There was a dark spot on his black pea coat right on his heart, and, following her instinct, she get to work. Removing the pea coat to get a better look at the wound; what she saw made her reel back in shock.

The indent over his chest was of a hand, she could actually see his beating heart and the smashed apart ribs from inside of his body. He should be dead!

But, the boys head lolled back and he emitted another agonizing groan. Rina's eyes widened even further as she watched the wound close on itself, watched as the ribs mended before muscle and skin covered it again. This was a mutant who could heal himself, and who knew what else. She looked over to Mayura quickly, "Go!" She said, prepared to run.

She was stopped by the boy grabbing her arm and pulling her down so that she was facing his brightly glowing red eyes, her heart pounding as he snarled madly at her.


	8. Chapter 8

"Try again." Logan ordered in his deep, burly voice. Sighing, Miles threw a look over to where he and Puppet were standing before looking back at his hands. Four hours of practice, and he had hardly been able to produce a spark; aparently, his power didn't work if his adreniline wasn't running fast enough. So they had tried a simulation, and still nothing, nothing aside from the bruise that he could feel growing along his back.

Muttering, he narrowed his eyes and crossed his jaw in frustration; from somewhere inside of him, he could feel a tingle, something growing inside of him, racing through his veins and flowing along with his blood. Streams of electricity shot from his hands.

He smiled hapily, "About time." Logan sighed, and Puppet barked his congratulations. Happy not to have a dud power, Miles put his free hand in front of the electricity to cut off the flow before forming a small electrical sphere. Logan still stood at a distance, still worried about how the electromagnetic field would affect his bones. "Good now try to-" He was cut off by the door leading into the Danger Room opening. A guy a little older than Miles came in, he was wearing dark, red, reflective glasses over his eyes and Miles figured this must have been the legondary Cyclops he had heard so much of.

"Logan, Xavier needs to talk to you." He said, and Miles saw Puppet flick his ears back. If Puppet didn't like the looks of this guy, Miles figured that he shouldn't either, but he couldn't judge someone he's just seen.

The wolverine man looked over to Miles with beady black eyes, "I'll be back in a second." He growled, and Miles looked over to Puppet, who was still glaring at Cyclopes, who was still looking at Logan with an impatient look plastered across his face.

The two of them slipped out of the Danger Room, the door sliding shut behind them, and Miles looked back down at the electric ball that was still floating above his hands. "Ok...turn off." He said to his hands. Nothing happened. "Hm..." He focused on trying to turn it off, imagining the electric waves they were sending out stopping, still the ball didn't disapear or shrink, instead, it seemed to keep on growing.

It was then that Puppet decided to take notice to his mutated friend, just in time to see him pleading with the electrical ball, "What's the problem?" He grummbled, limping over. "Just turn it off."

"Yeah, it doesn't exactly have an off switch..." The thing grew larger and Miles flinched as more energy went out of him, energy being used just to stop the electric ball from going crazy. "It's getting bigger isn't it?" He asked, eyes beginning to widen, he looked over to the coyote.

Puppet backed up a bit, "Miles, I'll give you five seconds to get rid of that thing."

"I'm trying!"

"Well, come on, try harder will you? That thing is GROWING!"

"Um, uh...um..."

"...Did you just...put it in your mouth..."

Miles nodded, his checks were getting fatter as the thing continued to grow, even inside of his mouth. It was shocking him, not a steady current, but it was like being shocked by an electric fence. Buzz-stop-buzz-stop-buzz-stop. "Well spit it out!" Puppet ordered, and Miles hastly obeyed, it dropped onto the ground, bouncing around as it did so. "No, pick it up, don't let it lose form!" He didn't hesitate, and picked it up in his hands, trying to hold it all together. "Try not to think about it!" Ha, try not to think about it? Why doesn't the coyote hold a ever growing ball of pure electrical might and then say, try not to think about it?

There was something prickling at the edge of his mind, telling him what he didn't want to hear. "I can't hold it any long-"

* * *

><p>Outside of the Danger Room, Charles and Logan were in a heated coversation, the brutal murders of fellow mutants was all that was on the senior mutants minds. Logan of course, suspected Sabertooth and the Acolytes, while Charles feared that it was something else. Suddenly, all the lights in the mansion flickered and failed, and everyone one was left in total darkness for five minutes. The reassuring grunting and groaning broke through the darkness as the old generator kicked into gear, the lights flashing back on.<p>

There was a low mechanical schreech and the door to the Danger Room opened, and, from the smoke, came the wide eyed coyote that had been Puppet. His fur was fluffed out and sticking in all directions, the tips of each strand black and frayed. The cast that had been on his leg was all but singed off. "I...hate...it...here..." The coyote forced out, his voice hoarse, suddenly he collasped, head lollying to the side.

From behind Puppet's now limp figure, Miles apeared, his hair also sticking up from static and his eyes wide like he had just seen a ghost. There was a rich black powder covering his face and he looked around like he wasn't sure where he was.

He stared at the two men, and the two men stared right back, both shocked, but still not as shocked as Puppet. "Miles, what happened?" Logan ordered with short drawn out words.

Miles blinked, trying to register the words, before his face went up in a wide smile, his eyes slowly glazing over; he laughed. "Haha...I, haha, made a, haha, boom boom!" After saying that Miles collasped overtop of his unlucky canine friend, and leaving two very confused, unspeakable, instatute teachers to look on at their limp bodies, for a few minutes just staring in surprise.

* * *

><p><strong>Elemental: Sorry this was so short, and crappy, but, we wanted to get something out, and, I have to say that we will not know exactly when we will update this. You see, our friend, Max, is very sick with cancer. Sadly, it was undetected since it was a tumor, and it is terminal. He's not going to be leaving the hospital until he's either ok or...well...I don't know.<strong>

**Helper: Dead. **

**Elemental: Yeah, thanks for that you evil, heartless, idiot. **

**Helper: Hey, I'm as sad as you, even sadder probably, but, I'm not going to lie to myself, only God can save him, so, if everyone can please pray for him, thank you! Um...so, yeah, hehe, we're going to update this as much as we can, but, don't expect it to often, because we also have school and things. So, yeah. **

**Elemental: Bye then, till next time. **


End file.
